Sony's made no secret of the fact that it's aggressively courting developers to its PSP platform, and to that end, it's simplifying the content pipeline and approval process for games on the platform.
The company's already
cut the price of PSP devkits, and now
reveals to UK website Develop that it will no longer require concept approval, offer shorter quality assurance processes, and allow low price points for some new titles.
According to the report, Sony's already signed on 50 studios, including iPhone developer Subatomic Studios (
Fieldrunners) and casual game company CandyStand, to work on "top-end" gaming experiences -- as well as "new initiatives for the PSP which take it beyond traditional gaming, but still include elements from gaming."
The list of creators making downloadable PSP games for this particular "specially-branded, separate area of the PlayStation Store" for PSP and PSP Go include India's Gameshastra and Creat Studios, a U.S. company with an office in St. Petersburg, Russia.
With the unveiling of the download-only PSP Go, unveiled at E3 and launching this fall, Sony looks to be seriously confronting Apple's rapid advance on the handheld gaming space by offering a diversity of gaming content available digitally.
The online game locker for PSP downloads will work in a similar way to Apple's iTunes, and Sony also often
hints at non-gaming applications for the device.
Apple makes its SDK publicly available, and Sony doesn't plan to take such a step. But in reducing costs and simplifying approval process, it's clearly trying to attract a broad slate of developers to its new platform, while still maintaining a standard of quality inherent in the investment of a professional development team.
